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House-Senate Negotiators Pass
The Homeland-Security Budget

Funds Set at $30.4 Billion
After Legislators Reject
Cargo-Screening Deadline

By

David RogersStaff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Updated Sept. 18, 2003 12:44 a.m. ET

WASHINGTON -- House-Senate negotiators approved a $30.4 billion homeland-security budget after rejecting demands that Congress set a deadline for requiring mandatory screening of freight cargo on passenger flights for explosives.

The House voted overwhelmingly in June to begin screening this fall, but the airline industry and the Bush administration protested that the deadline was too sudden and would effectively shut down a source of revenue valued at $3 billion a year to troubled airlines.